Chronic Fear

Chronic fear, the tangled up knots bound up inside of me, 

keeping me stuck, keeping me small, afraid to move, afraid to live. 

Tied up, knotted up, bound, body, mind, and soul, the stories I tell myself keep me stuck 

and limited in how much freedom I feel.

No true agency, unable to move freely, 

the same four walls of fear and isolation,

no way out. 

Trapped. I cannot move, and I cannot breathe, 

locked in a maze of fear and helplessness, 

my body contracted and tight, with no space for living life. 

Only surviving, 

JUST surviving, never thriving.

What keeps me so stuck, 

and what is the way out of this seemingly 

endless maze and repeating cycles of fear?

Every time I feel the sensations of activation 

and fear in my body that can feel so overwhelming, 

I escape into my head, and my inner narrator starts up her monologue,

telling her scary stories and showing me terrifying images

about why I feel what I feel…about how to make it stop, and how to control it.

Looping, fearful, limiting, defeatist, frightening thoughts,

agonizing over what might happen and how I can fix it.

I get stuck there, in the catastrophizing thoughts, trying to find a solution, a way out,

torturing myself endlessly, blocking myself into the fear even more with each thought.

“You can’t handle it, you’re not enough, you can’t, you don’t know how,

and even if you try, it won’t work, it will all go sideways,

and they don’t want you anyway.

What are you thinking?!

It’s all insurmountable, why can’t I just escape?!”

My mind is resistant to feeling anything unpleasant, and it tries to escape through control.

My attempts to control and escape, 

and the catastrophizing

and worst-case-scenario thought patterns and frightening images

become over-coupled, knotted up with the sensations of fear,

locking me into patterns of hyperactivation and panic.

To ‘’escape,’’ to move through the feelings of fear, 

I drop the thoughts and solution-seeking, 

I stop making a problem out of my body’s sensations.

I come out of my mind and into the soft warmth of my body, and I ask,

“How do I know I am feeling fear? Where do I feel it in my body?”

I get a sense, and feeling of the resources of safety that are available to me, 

the calmness in other parts of my body, my dog sitting next to me, the light of the sun on my face,

and I recognize that I do have the capacity to feel what is here.

I allow the sensations of fear to express themselves

and move through me…

I accept their presence. 

I ground myself, and I breathe,

meeting my fear with openness and kindness, 

and they pass.